


Ezran's Scheme

by nonameforhire



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Blushing, Dating, F/M, Featuring, First Kiss, Modern AU, Mutual Pining, and that should about cover it, callum being a disaster, claudia and ezran making bets for jelly tarts, ezran being a little shit, harrow loves toto, i got my first tumblr prompt and it consumed my life for twelve hours, kind of, rayla also being a disaster but not to the point where she almost falls off a cliff, trying to ask for a date and being too much of a coward should be a tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-24
Updated: 2020-03-24
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:00:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23288176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nonameforhire/pseuds/nonameforhire
Summary: Callum likes Rayla. Rayla likes Callum. The problem? They're both too scared to ask the other out on a date, and not even sure how to do it in the first place. So, of course, Ezran gets involved―which is both the best and worst thing that could possibly happen.(It's definitely the best.)
Relationships: Callum/Rayla (The Dragon Prince)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 117





	Ezran's Scheme

**Author's Note:**

> dagrnrose said: "prompt. rayllum are trying to ask eschother on a date so they both went to ezran for emotional support but they dont listen to his advice of keeping it simple so instead he lays out a very obvious trap for them to just watch the sunset together cuz kids am i rite🤷🏻♀️"
> 
> and i, of course, had to oblige, and it, of course, got way longer than i meant it to.

“Ezran! Ezran Ezran _Ezranezranezran!”_

Ezran blinked and looked up from a grumpy Bait to see Callum _careening_ into the room, clumsily sliding over the linoleum floor in his bare socks and barely avoiding slamming into the kitchen counter.

“Wh―Callum?” Ezran asked, standing from his seat at the kitchen table and staring at his brother, who was now hunched over and breathing heavily. Considering the way that he had run all the way to the kitchen and was not athletic in the slightest, it came as little surprise. What was more surprising, however, was the crazed look in his eye. “What’s wrong?”

“Ezran!” Callum managed, looking up at him so dramatically that his brown hair flopped over his forehead comically. “Ezran, I have a problem!”

Ezran hugged Bait close to his chest, ignoring the cat’s grumbling. “What is it? Is it something at school?”

“Yes! No! Kind of?” Callum took a breath and finally straightened before taking his phone out of his pocket and shoving it under Ezran’s nose. “Look at this!”

It took Ezran a moment to get his eyes to concentrate, and he was sure that he looked cross-eyed, but what Callum was showing him was…a Snapchat conversation.

 **[sailorrayla] (1:04):** lol you’re such a dork

 **[mageboy] (1:05):** i am not!!!!

 **[sailorrayla] (1:06):** that’s exactly what a dork would say

 **[mageboy] (1:08):** :(

 **[sailorrayla] (1:11):** lmao you know i love u sad prince

“I…don’t see the problem?” Ezran said, leaning away from the phone in front of his face. Granted, he was only twelve and didn’t really text people a lot, but none of that seemed particularly...problematic?

“She said she _loved_ me!” Callum’s eyes were wild. It would have been _amusing_ , if Ezran hadn’t seen the way he’d nearly killed himself running into the kitchen.

“Uh…okay?” Ezran replied, not entirely sure where this was going. “Is this some sort of…” He leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, “sandwich thing?”

He didn’t think it was possible for Callum’s eyes to get any wider than they did, but that’s exactly what happened. 

“I…no! No it’s―” He cut himself off abruptly, hanging his head in defeat. “Yes. That’s exactly what it is.”

Ezran hummed in acknowledgement, taking out the small flip phone that he only really used to text about three people. 

**[ezran] (1:22):** claudia u owe me a jelly tart

Callum didn’t even notice that Ezran had texted someone, as enraptured as he was with the phone in his own hands. He kept typing for a few seconds, then deleting it, then typing, and then deleting it again.

“Callum,” Ezran said, putting a hand on his big brother’s shoulder. “If you like her that much, then why don’t you just ask her out already?”

Callum’s cheeks immediately colored themselves as red as the jelly still sitting out on the counter. “Wh-what? N-N-No, I can’t do that. She’s―we’re best friends? What if…what if she doesn’t…” He trailed off, shrinking into himself as if he had given up some sort of painful secret. And he probably would have, if the way he felt about Rayla (or, more accurately, the way they felt about _each other_ ) wasn’t painfully obvious for everyone in a five mile radius.

“Callum,” Ezran said, using the voice that he knew got his older brother to listen. Ezran had cultivated it very carefully over the past few years. “She does.”

Callum blinked at him once. Twice. Then he shook his head violently, his face taking on the same hue as his scarf.

“N-no,” he said. “That can’t be right. She’s…she’s so awesome that she could date anyone she wants!”

“And has she?”

“Well…no, but…”

“And who does she spend basically all of her time with?”

“Well…me, but…”

“And how many times have you both gone to a movie together without calling it a date?”

Callum was blinking at him again, and Ezran could practically _see_ everything flashing through his head like a projected film. Then, in a voice so tiny Ezran might have misheard it if he hadn’t been listening, Callum spoke.

“You…you really think she…?”

“Yeah, me and everyone else in town, Callum. Ask Claudia! She’s got an eye for these things, or at least that’s what she says…” Ezran scratched at his scalp as Bait grumbled out a low-pitched meow in his other hand. “Actually, maybe don’t. She also thought that ‘unstoppable was just another kind of stoppable.’ That was a _weird_ football game.”

Callum smiled softly, then reached over and ruffled Ezran’s hair. “Thanks, Ez.” He paused, his smile twitching anxiously. “Uh…you don’t happen to have any advice on...how to, uh, do that? D-Do you?”

Ezran fixed Callum with his best stern look, borrowed from all the times Harrow had directed it at him. “Callum, I’m twelve.”

“Ah. Right. Nevermind, then. Maybe I could ask Soren…?”

Ezran winced in advance. He may have been twelve, but even he knew that Soren’s advice for matters like this would be…less than ideal.

“Callum?” Callum looked back up at him, in the middle of drafting a text to Soren. Ezran shook his head and fixed his brother with as encouraging a smile as he could muster. “Just…keep it simple. You’re her best friend! You don’t need to do anything fancy for her, you just need to be yourself.”

Callum’s smile returned full-force. “Yeah. Yeah, okay. Thanks, Ez.”

As he returned to his phone, Ezran’s chimed. Making sure that Callum couldn’t see the (admittedly tiny) screen, Ezran pulled it back out of his pocket and checked his messages.

 **[clauds] (1:34):** wait wat? Is it finallyy happenhing????

Ezran glanced back up at Callum, who had gone from panicked to smiling at the device in his hands, a dopey grin on his face as his phone dinged.

 **[ezran] (1:36):** i think so

**~~~**

Ezran’s phone beeped not twenty minutes later while he was trying his best to steal a jelly tart without Harrow noticing. It wasn’t particularly hard, considering that the man had a big set of headphones on and was humming an out of tune rendition of _Africa._ Even so, Ezran had to rush out of the kitchen with an armful of jelly tarts before his father could notice. Only when he was in the safety of his bedroom did he bother to check who it was that had texted him.

 **[rayla] (1:53):** ezran

 **[rayla] (1:53):** ezran i have a problem

Ezran frowned at his phone as he put his stolen goods on his bed. Rayla usually texted him memes about animals or something similar. A wicked grin spread across his face as an idea sprouted in his brain.

 **[ezran] (2:00):** is this problem by any chance callum related?

A long pause. Ezran stuffed a jelly tart in his mouth―difficult because of the massive grin spreading across his face.

 **[rayla] (2:04):** what gave you that idea?

 **[ezran] (2:05):** call it a hunch

 **[ezran] (2:05):** what’s up?

Another pause. Ezran broke off a piece of another jelly tart and was in the middle of carefully feeding it to Bait when his phone beeped again.

 **[rayla] (2:10):** promise you won’t laugh

Ezran snorted, then covered his mouth and looked around the bedroom as if afraid that Rayla would somehow catch him in the act. Considering the number of times she had appeared in their window (which was based on the _second floor_ ), it wouldn’t surprise him.

 **[ezran] (2:11):** i promise

Her response came not a second later, as if she had been waiting for his response. Knowing her, she probably just wanted to get it over with before she could back out of it.

 **[rayla] (2:11):** how do i ask ur brother on a date

Ezran choked on the jelly tart he’d only just started to swallow. When he’d recovered, having to assure Bait that he wasn’t dying, there was already a text message waiting for him.

 **[rayla] (2:13):** ur laughing arent u

 **[ezran] (2:14):** choking actually

 **[ezran] (2:14):** what brought this on

 **[ezran] (2:15):** claudia said u were still in “pining” mode

 **[rayla] (2:16):** I WAS NOT IN PINING MODE

 **[ezran] (2:16):** like the tree?

 **[rayla] (2:18):** i 

**[rayla] (2:18):** i mean yes. exactly like a tree. what’s it that callum always says?

 **[rayla] (2:18):** trees to meet you

 **[rayla] (2:19):** yeah

 **[rayla] (2:21):** um but i might have accidentally told callum i loved him earlier

 **[rayla] (2:21):** like on accident

 **[rayla] (2:22):** and like. it’s tru so

 **[ezran] (2:23):**!!!!!!

 **[rayla] (2:23):** DONT YOU DARE TEXT CLAUDIA ABOUT THIS

 **[ezran] (2:24):** i wasn’t going to

 **[rayla] (2:24):** you just deleted a draft to her didnt u

 **[ezran] (2:25):** maybe

 **[rayla] (2:26):** okay. but ur his brother. how do i do it

Ezran giggled at his phone. They were both so hopeless. He wished that his phone was advanced enough for him to send pictures of these conversations to Claudia, then decided against it even if it was possible. He wouldn’t want to betray Rayla’s trust like that, even if it was hilarious.

 **[ezran] (2:28):** cant u just ask him

 **[rayla] (2:29):** no? smh what kind of question

 **[rayla] (2:30):** he’s c a l l u m

 **[rayla] (2:30):** he deserves like

 **[rayla] (2:31):** balloons and chandeliers and fancy crap

 **[rayla] (2:32):** balloons are fancy right

 **[ezran] (2:33):** im twelve how am i supposed to know

 **[rayla] (2:34):** ur the mayor’s kid

 **[ezran] (2:34):** and?

 **[rayla] (2:34):** ezran.

 **[rayla] (2:35):** how do i ask callum out

 **[rayla] (2:36):** i wanna do it before i lose my nerve

 **[ezran] (2:37):** just keep it simple yknow

 **[rayla] (2:38):** simple how

 **[ezran] (2:39):** like

 **[ezran] (2:40):** ask him to the movies or something

 **[rayla] (2:41):** we go to the movies all the time ezran what if he thinks it’s like platonic

 **[ezran] (2:42):** then ask him to watch the sunset with you or something i don’t know

 **[ezran] (2:43):** sunsets are romantic right? there’s that cliff near our house that u can use

 **[rayla] (2:44):** maybe

 **[rayla] (2:44):** shoot. ethari’s home i gotta help him with groceries

 **[rayla] (2:45):** thx ez

 **[ezran] (2:46):** i get to be the best man in the wedding right

 **[rayla] (2:46):** i dont care how old u are im blocking u 

**~~~**

It became painfully apparent after a week, however, that neither of them were going to make the first move. Callum got really jumpy whenever Ezran asked him about it and always found an excuse to be anywhere else, and Rayla always sent a meme of a bear sitting down with the text “plz bear with me” when Ezran asked her. When he texted Claudia and asked if she knew anything about their plans, she’d told him that she was just in the dark as he was.

And so, as always, Ezran was going to have to take matters into his own hands.

**~~~**

“Ezran,” Callum said with a sigh, pushing hair out of his eyes with a free hand. “What are we doing here?”

“You said you wanted a good spot for sketching! This is a good spot!” 

“Yeah, Ez, but I said I wanted a _new_ spot for sketching. You and I have been here hundreds of times. I’ve gotten a bunch of good sketches out of this place.” Callum shivered and pulled his coat tighter around himself. “And it’s getting late, and _cold_ , too.”

“Well, yeah!” Ezran said, hoping it wasn’t immediately obvious that he was lying through his teeth. He would have thought that his years of jelly tart thievery would have prepared him for this! “But have you ever sketched the _sunset_ before?”

“I…no, but I didn’t bring any of my paints with me.”

Ezran gestured wildly to the sun, which was just starting to kiss the ground. It was quite the sight to behold, standing on the cliff near their house, with so many colors that Ezran was half-convinced he’d never seen before. The cliff itself was no eyesore, with the town stretched out beneath them and blue rose bushes on either side of the path. It was _beautiful_ …and also the perfect spot for a trap.

“C’mon, let’s walk to the edge,” Ezran said, tugging Callum forward by the arm and doing his best not to show how he was _vibrating_ with anticipation.

Callum chuckled and quickly followed so that he was no longer being dragged. “All right, but if you fall over the edge, _I’m_ not explaining things to Dad.”

“Pshh, he’d probably too busy blessing the rains down in Africa anyway.”

They both giggled at that. Harrow’s obsession with Toto was no secret.

Ezran’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He’d finally figured out how to put the cheap phone on silent, so that Callum wouldn’t catch on. When Ezran finished dragging Callum to the edge, he noticed that the older boy still pulled out his sketchbook to begin working on something, staring intently at the town below. Ezran pulled out his phone as soon as the coast was clear.

 **[rayla] (6:40):** are you sure this is the place 

**[rayla] (6:40):** where do i go

Ezran grinned, and then quickly wiped the expression off his face. This was going _exactly_ as planned.

 **[ezran] (6:44):** just walk around the big tree and then go straight from there you should be able to see it just fine after that

“Who’re you texting?” Callum asked.

Ezran nearly jumped out of his skin. It was a good thing he hadn’t been standing close to the edge, otherwise someone really would have had to explain why the mayor’s young son went toppling over the side of a cliff.

“N-No one!” he exclaimed. Curse his pre-pubescent voice! “No one important!”

Callum narrowed his eyes at him. “Ezran, are you lying?”

Before Ezran could even _think_ to deny that, an accented voice cut through his panic.

“Ezran, you out here?”

Callum whirled around, heart suddenly going a million miles a minute. He knew that voice like he knew his sketchbook―only his sketchbook didn’t make his palms sweat like this.

Horrified, knowing _exactly_ what this looked like, he looked over at Ezran―only to find that Ezran wasn’t there anymore. Callum was completely alone as the approaching footsteps only grew louder, and in that moment he seriously considered jumping into one of the rosebushes to hide, thorns be damned.

_Oh no._

Before Callum could even process what to do next, the object of his panic―and, apparently, his not-so-secret admiration―came around the corner, squinting down at her phone with a frown on her face.

If a brain could make a record scratch, that’s what Callum’s would have done in that moment. Every single panicked thought running through his head screeched to a halt the moment he saw her, bathed in the light of the setting sun, white hair waving in the wind.

He’d always known that Rayla was beautiful. But _man_ , in that moment _beautiful_ wasn’t a good enough word―and neither was _gorgeous, stunning,_ or _alluring._ His tongue caught on the roof of his mouth, and he found that if he’d had any words to say in that moment (probably something stupid), they would have tumbled over the side of the cliff behind him.

It wasn’t that she looked any different than how she normally did. Rayla hardly ever differed in her choice of outfit (a “sensible” hoodie, “functional” jeans, and “iconic” Converse sneakers). It was just…

It was like when he’d scroll through his Instagram feed, and would find one particular account that took pictures of people in the middle of reading their book. Most of the time those people thought they were alone, and so had no qualms about holding the book close to their face, reacting to the text shamelessly, and perching on the edge of their seat. They were in their natural element, completely not caring about whether or not anyone else was there to see them.

 _That_ was what it was like to see Rayla in that moment. Unhindered, unembarrassed…just _Rayla._ He _loved_ it when he got to see that side of her. It was one of the things that had wrestled affection for her out of his hesitant heart in the first place.

Of course, the _second_ that Rayla looked up from her phone and saw him standing there, that all vanished. He wasn’t expecting her face to take on the sheer panic that it did, but the loud yelp that escaped from her mouth when she saw him standing there scared him enough to make him drop his sketchbook and stumble backwards a bit, even closer to the edge of the cliff.

The second his foot kicked a rock over the edge and his stomach plummeted with it, Rayla was there, grabbing his arm and tugging him away from the ledge…and subsequently closer to her.

“Uh,” she said, staring at him for a moment. They really were very close; close enough for Callum to take in every shade of the violet in her eyes, close enough for him to note how to sunset reflected in them, close enough for him to feel her breath against his face. Then she stepped away, and it was like the world started turning again. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Callum breathed, then shook his head to shatter the spell. “Uh, I mean. Hi. Did Ezran con you into coming here too?”

 _There_ was the patented Rayla smirk. If he hadn’t known that she had a habit of using it to cover up her nervousness, he would have thought she was the picture of suave confidence, especially with the way she popped out her hip and crossed her arms like she did when she was annoyed.

“Yep,” she said, popping the ‘p’ at the end. “He said that he wanted to learn how to ‘sweep the leg’ or something like that to use on Soren. What did he tell _you_ to get you here?”

“Oh,” Callum said, waving his hand around in an undetermined gesture that didn’t really mean anything. “Just…a sketching opportunity, I suppose. He said it would take my breath away.” Then, before his common sense could stop him, “It’s a good thing you showed up then, otherwise I would have had to call him a liar.”

He bit his tongue as soon as the words were out of his mouth. That was something that best friends said to each other right? Would she think she was weird? Would she be so angry with him that she ended up shoving him over the side of the cliff anyway?

Then he remembered what Ezran had told him. Simply, “ _She does.”_ When he looked up at Rayla, too embarrassed to meet her eyes before, he found that her face was a pretty shade of pink, too vibrant to be blamed on the light of the sunset behind him. She had a slight curve to her mouth, a little half-smile that made his stomach do a backflip. She wasn’t looking at him, but there was an inexplicable light in her eyes, too.

Callum really wished he had brought his paints. He wanted to capture her expression forever. _He’d_ made her flustered like that. _Rayla_ (who’d once jumped over the hood of a car to punch a kid who’d called her mother and father cowards) was _blushing_ because of something that _Callum_ (who’d once tripped and given himself a concussion after Rayla had thrown her coat at him to hold during that fight) had said.

He had the words prepared from before. He’d been trying all week to try and ask her to dinner, to go _somewhere,_ _together_ , that would breach that gap between best friends and something _more_. Now was the perfect time to―

“Doyouwanttogooutwithme?” Rayla said, fast enough for all of her words to rush together, yet leave _Callum_ unable to breathe yet again. She said it again after taking a deep breath, more slowly, leaving no room for miscommunication. “Do you…want to go out with me? O-On a date? Like, er, romantically?”

Now he really was breathless. They had a habit of doing that, he realized. Saying and doing things that some would consider a little _too much_ for platonic, toeing the line of _romantic._ The way they always held hands, how they took turns falling asleep on each other during their shared study halls, how she had kissed him on the cheek after a particularly bad day. How could he not have seen it before? How could he have missed the cute little way that Rayla was fiddling with the ends of her hair, waiting for his answer?

Wait, _shit,_ she was _waiting for his answer!_

“―okay if you say no,” Rayla was in the middle of rambling (since when was _she_ the one who rambled?). “I-I just meant that as a j-joke! Yeah, a joke. Like that weird little, uh, ‘trees to meet you’ thing you do, except you never really say it as a joke and I―”

Callum leaned forward and silenced her rapidly moving mouth with his own.

It was really barely a kiss, just the barest brush of lips that somehow still managed to make his heart leap out of his chest and tumble down the side of the cliff. He hadn’t even meant to do it, either. He’d just been watching her embarrassedly ramble and wanted to put her out of her misery and she’d just looked so _cute_ and he wouldn’t have been able to say anything anyway―

 _“YES!”_ a voice screeched from the bushes.

Rayla and Callum jumped apart, and once more he nearly went flying over the edge before she caught him _again_ and tugged him toward her again. She jumped even further away when she was done, face as red as the now almost-vanished sun. But Callum’s horrified eyes were already fixed on the mess of hair emerging from a rose bush, phone camera pointed directly at them.

“Now Claudia owes me _two_ jelly tarts!” Ezran exclaimed, practically dancing as he extricated himself from the bush. Before Callum could stop him, he was already sending the picture he’d taken to Claudia, and Callum could only blink in response. That is, until he heard Rayla’s flustered cough next to him.

 _“Ezran!”_ Callum found it in himself to bark, more out of sheer embarrassment than any sort of anger.

“Oh,” Ezran said, eyes widening as he looked between the pair he’d interrupted. “Uh. I think I should go now.”

He was running before Callum or Rayla could say anything else―not that Rayla really _needed_ to say anything else, considering the terrible death glare she’d fixed him with. Still, Ezran couldn’t help the elated feeling in his chest as he glanced at the abashed pair behind him. At least something good had come out of this scheme that would _definitely_ result in brotherly punishment later. Ezran made a point to slow down when he was out of sight but still in earshot, straining to hear what they said.

He could barely make out the sound of pages flapping in the wind, presumably the sound of Callum’s sketchbook as he picked it up. The silence between the two was simmering like oil in a pan, though it seemed to be more uncertainty than anything.

“I meant it, you know,” Callum eventually said, his voice almost too quiet for Ezran to hear. “When I said you were breathtaking. You always have been.”

Though Ezran couldn’t hear it, he could almost _see_ the way that Rayla swallowed nervously―it was an anxious tic of hers. “I…thank you.”

More silence. The wind rustled the leaves of the bushes nearby.

“Did you mean it too?” Rayla asked, her voice suddenly too loud as if she had forced herself to speak. “The…the, uh.” A pause. “The _kiss._ ”

“Yeah,” Callum replied, almost instantly. Then, of course, his nerves got ahold of him. “W-Was that okay?” His voice cracked nervously. Ezran stifled a snicker. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable or anything, but I really didn’t know what to say and you looked so panicked so I’m sorry if―”

There was a short pause that made Ezran suspect he might have earned a _third_ jelly tart if he’d snapped a picture in time. Then Rayla spoke again, a little softer than she had before.

“ _Callum_ . It was fine. M-More than fine. I promise. But, uh…that was a _yes_ , right?”

 _“Yes._ It was _so_ a yes. Definitely _yes._ ”

“Oh. Good. Because I was recently informed that watching the sunset with someone is romantic, so if you’re willing…?”

Ezran grinned as he made his way back to the house. Whatever trouble he got in when Callum returned, it was _so_ worth it. They deserved each other.

 _And,_ Ezran thought as he got an incomprehensible mess of letters and excitement supposed to pass as a text back from Claudia, _I think I’ve earned those jelly tarts._

**Author's Note:**

> so, yeah. that was a thing. hope you guys enjoyed because this whole quarantine thing is boring me to t e a r s. i sunk my teeth into the first writing thing that came my way. you might get more out of me because of this, honestly.
> 
> that being said come check me out on tumblr because i was bullied into getting one and it's actually not that bad. im nonameforhire-ao3, if u wanna say hi.
> 
> a big thanks to @Elite_7 for giving this a once-over for me! y'all should check out her fics or have your kneecap privileges revoked.


End file.
